Soviet Women in Combat: A History of Violence on the Eastern Front Book

Though the language is clunky and loaded with ponderous terminology, Krylova's "non-oppositional but binary" gender category is always impressive, and alternatively frustrating and enlightening. What this basically means is that Krylova came to understand the Soviet women combatants as individuals who were able to simultaneously claim the title of soldier (which they viewed as a neural or mutually-accessible role) while maintaining (and asserting!) their femininity, thus their frequent descriptions of themselves as women-soldiers, women-machinegunners, women-pilots, etc. It's a fascinating approach which bears some similarities to third-wave feminism that I eagerly await someone taking as a departure point for studies of women and gender in the post-Vietnam volunteer military.

One unfortunate choice Krylova makes is a decision to not engage with much radical femininity before the Stalinist period, which leaves out women who fought in the Russian Civil War, as well as women who were political radicals à la Chernyshevsky's Vera Pavlova or the very real Alexandra Kollontai.